ARLINGTON In spite on ongoing street construction on Olympic Avenue, the Local Scoop kicked off its sixth-annual ice cream eating contest, barely an hour before French Avenue was cleared for the first cars, marchers and floats at 5 p.m.
However, without the crowds who usually gather on Olympic Avenue for the parade, this years contest only attracted enough competitors to fill up one of its three age groups.
Dawn Williams, owner of the Local Scoop, nonetheless set out paper plates of Neapolitan ice cream for the 10-years-old and younger participants, dishing out a half-gallon for each child. She promised the first-place winner a T-shirt, a Frisbee and a $20 gift certificate to the Local Scoop.
Its a serious competition, said Williams, who added that each years proceeds go toward the Arlington Food Bank. They have to eat a half-gallon of ice cream each, with no hands and no utensils. If youre going to do it, its a good idea to diet beforehand and start the day of the contest with an Advil for the headache you will get.
This years ice cream eating contest was the first for 10-year-old Blake Hathaway and sisters Hannah and Emme Calvert. Both Hathaway and eight-year-old Emme claimed they never suffer brain freeze from eating ice cream too fast, while Hathaway explained that hed prepared for the event by eating ice cream three nights in a row.
Hathaways mother Julie and the Calvert sisters father Audie agreed that all their children were obsessed with ice cream. Audie ceded the edge in the contest to Emme, even though shes two years younger than her sister.
Audie Calverts prediction was not far off, since Emme ate 4.5 ounces of ice cream within the allotted three minutes, while Hannah ate four ounces, and out of his paper plate of two pounds, five ounces of ice cream, Hathaway ate all but one pound, 13 ounces.
The hardest part was how cold your teeth get, said Hathaway, the winner.